casinos (0.00 / 0)

I tend to disagree with you here.  If you don't oppose casino gambling on moral grounds than we can look at a casino like another other business, say a movie theater.  Casinos employ people and if they are well run have a decent profit margin. In that sense a person could treat a gambling loss in much the same way they would a movie ticket and a bucket of popcorn.  People are just paying for entertainment.  The problem is attaining a critical mass of people with disposal income to frequent any establishment, whether it be a movie theater or a casino.  Its almost certain that a $X million investment in or around Benton Harbor would boost the local economy.  Any strategy to increase investment in the state shouldn't be poo-bah'd as an "unreal premise that you can get something for nothing".  Building new casinos that attracts outside investment and employ people (which both add to the local and state tax coffers) is not something for nothing, it is standard economic and business practice.
I don't want casinos all over Michigan.  I would love to see silicon valley lite in and around Ann Arbor, a revitalized automobile industry, and a robust tourism sector (based on conservation and our considerable natural beauty) and I hope that is the direction we as a state decide to go.  Argue that we don't want to be Atlantic City, or even Las Vegas, we want an economy based on technology and high educational achievement and as a state we will do whatever we can to attract outside investment for bio-tech start-ups or the manufacture of wind turbines, dont claim that a casino is "something for nothing" when its just not true.  
         

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by: Nate @ Tue Mar 09, 2010 at 02:53:06 AM UTC

Casinos are not any other business (0.00 / 0)

Casinos appeal to persons who have problems with gambling (and to some who do not). They may create jobs, but they also create financial hardship, bankruptcy, damaged families, etc.  They generate a need for social services for those who are addicted, and for their family members who have problems because of that addiction.  Yet I don't see how those costs are being figured into the "benefits" of the casino business.

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by: Kidspeak @ Tue Mar 09, 2010 at 03:51:53 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Not true (0.00 / 0)

Your assumption that "casinos appeal to persons who have promblems with gambling (and to some who do not)." simply doesn't seem to play itself out in reality.  In reality, MOST gamblers gamble responsibly, and treat it as any other form of entertainment they partake in.

I'm with Nate.  I'm not a huge proponent of gaming.  In fact, if given the choice to vote for one in my city of Lansing, I'd vote it down.  At the end of the day, I don't see why the existing casinos should have a monopoly on these things, or why a community shouldn't have the choice of whether or not it wants such an establishment.  The latter reason is my reason for not being opposed to this.  It comes down to an issue of choice.  I mean, I don't like cigerattes, don't drink, and I don't get the point of weed/pot, but those are issues of personal choice and preference.  I think all three of those, individually -- let alone combined -- do a helluva lot of more social damage than a casino ever could, but that's really irrelevant to me.

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by: MiddleGrandGuy @ Tue Mar 09, 2010 at 07:30:22 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Same phenomenon as alcohol (4.00 / 3)

"Most gamblers gamble responsibly".  So what?  Most gamblers (the "responsible ones") don't spend enough to matter.  The people running casinos don't care about the person who goes there once a year and wastes $200.  They care about the much smaller number who are wasting their savings or embezzling $200,000 from the church, and are there day after day until they're ruined.  If you GO to a casino, most of the people you see there are addicts.  And most of the house win comes from addicts.  And most of the social damage is from addicts.

The only time the large number of casual gamblers matter is if you take a sample of people NOT AT THE CASINO RIGHT NOW and ask them if they ever gamble.

Similarly, "most people drink less than 2 drinks per day".  That's true, but they don't drink enough alcohol to match the 5% of the population who are drinking enough to maintain a continual non-zero blood alcohol.  They're the people who keep bars and distillers in business.  They're the ones who are ruining their lives.  And they're the people you'd find if you interview people in line at a liquor store or staying until closing at a pub.  They drink 80% of the alcohol that gets consumed.  But if you survey people NOT AT A BAR, you'll find that 60% of the population drinks "responsibly".  

Gambling is a cancer, but if you survey the population not currently being treated for it, you'll find that cancer isn't a big problem.  It's only a big problem for the people who have it.

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by: Grebner @ Tue Mar 09, 2010 at 12:58:06 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

This is exactly what I was thinking (0.00 / 0)

...put more cogently by Grebner, as usual.

My question is, can we quantify this in any way? Probably not, because the ones with the best knowledge of the proportion of money coming from recreational vs. addicted gamblers, the casinos themselves, are never going to allow that information to become public.  

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by: memiller @ Tue Mar 09, 2010 at 22:10:17 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Social damage (4.00 / 1)

My objection with casinos is that they bring with them the allure of easy money, of getting something for nothing.  It's the extension of the mindset that you don't need to work to build something, that rewards will simply grace your hands if you wish hard enough.  On the small scale, I suppose it's just another way that truly successful people are separated from the pack.  As an engine for economic revitalization ... well, it seems like just one step beyond building an economy based on underwriting packages of bad mortgages and credit default swaps.

Among the Trees

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by: Eric B. @ Tue Mar 09, 2010 at 15:29:14 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

the vast majority of people who go to casinos do gamble responsibly (0.00 / 0)

That's like saying: "The vast majority of people who own handguns are responsible, ethical, sane people."  

Yes, that is correct.  

It is the Infinitesimally small group of people who are NOT that we have to spend billions of dollars every year protecting ourselves against.  

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by: Buster Vainamoinen @ Tue Mar 09, 2010 at 19:58:16 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

How (0.00 / 0)

How is this different from regulating alcohol, cigarettes, handguns...?  My concern is that I don't get how this industry can be singled out for the harm it causes.  Again, if you ask me, the aforementioned industries are far more harmful, even individually than the gaming industry.

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by: MiddleGrandGuy @ Wed Mar 10, 2010 at 05:46:40 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

You know...I was just thinking (0.00 / 0)

about all the mobsters and hookers that hang out at the candy stand at my local theater...

The joke about gambling will save us all is that everyone envisions themselves as the next Las Vegas...but they won't be, there is only one Las Vegas...what they all end up as, in some form or another is they become Atlantic City.

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by: Nazgul35 @ Tue Mar 09, 2010 at 17:07:26 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Saginaw (0.00 / 0)

"You know I was just thinking about all the mobsters and hookers that hang out at the candy stand at my local theater..."

That's why we hung out in Midland while growing up despite the longer drive.  ;)

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by: Brady @ Wed Mar 10, 2010 at 01:34:49 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Moral objection (0.00 / 0)

I hate casinos.  Yet, I also wonder about my own hypocrisy here since I don't have an objection to bars.  And alcoholism is just as addictive as gambling and far more harmful to society overall.  So apart from personally not enjoying gambling but enjoying a draft Dark Horse Ale with friends at our local pub, is my objection to casinos anything more than personal preference?  And is it the responsibility of the state to restrict gambling or the sale of alcohol, tobacco, pornography or even marijuana because it results in addictive behavior by a minority of adults?  How far do we take regulating public safety, health and welfare?

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by: Brady @ Wed Mar 10, 2010 at 01:32:29 AM UTC

The pub has served a traditional purpose in American life... (0.00 / 0)

The local bar has served mostly not as a place to go get loaded, but to be around people.  Casinos exist mostly to fatten the pockets of the owners by tricking rubes into believing that that next nickel they plug in that might otherwise cover the mortgage will put them on Easy Street for life.

I don't have moral objections with that.  It strikes me more as another pitfall you need to avoid (avoiding it is pretty simple ... don't go into a casino).  But, I do understand people's moral objections to expanding gaming (see Grebner's comment).  I just don't think it's in any way a smart way economic development.

Among the Trees

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by: Eric B. @ Wed Mar 10, 2010 at 13:50:33 PM UTC

[ Parent ]